Chariots for Hire

Hail the palatial cabbies

Dougie the Cabbie

A knowledgeable hound

A streetwise conveyor profound

With memory flair

Will arrive anywhere

A mind-map of routes all around

Picking up fares

When the hire-light glares

To a journey that’s anyone’s guess

Maybe a tour or a sightsee explore

Wheeler dealing his Taxi Express

In a city of streets

Where the plentiful meets
Politicians with cabinet seats

Rest assured that he would

For the great and the good

Every journey time promptly completes

This rhyme is written specially for 
Douglas John Davis
London Cabbie Recently Retired

Fly-by-Light

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Music swirls about my garden
In a consonant of leaves
A mesmerising random dance
In a flush of light reprieves

They rise and spin and circle in
Impishly they stop then sleight
In bends and curves meandering
As though dissolving in the light

Listen well, they whisper boldly
Though they sing in secret mode
With crescendo innuendo
They harmonise in breezy code

What A Corker!

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Boil me up a biffin dish

With custard steaming hot

Maybe add a crumble crust

Or placed within a pastry cot

The biffin may be chipped or mashed

A soft and tasty chomp

A regal meal to please a Queen

After a promenade in pomp

There is no perfect time to serve

A distinguished wedge of biffin

Breakfast lunch or dinnertime 

A gleeful treat at tiffin

Gratitude

Picture by: Caleb Chen unsplash.com

Who would have thought, a year of mayhem wrought

With silent menace hanging in the air

No dropping hats where welcoming’s consort

Empty avenues full of nothing but to stare

Each tomorrow was another bad news day

Hopeful longing for good times to return

We then resigned it was the only way

To wait to be released from our concern

We need not crave those far-off prospects

Where crowds converge in cordial vein

For a while we’ll live in lesser times

Till days when carefree choices come again

May we never forget how much we owe

Those frontline heroes who took a mighty blow

The Fixer

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When in need of some attention

Where something will not work

We need a problem solver-guy 

To readjust the knotted quirk

Someone always knows someone

Who can mend the mishap quick

A patient hand with implements

A Fixer and a fiddlestick

Such a way with tangled muddles

And a feel for twists and turns

Unfold a crease to then release

The Fixer solves and then adjourns

Later when The Fixer’s left

People sit there taking tea

Reflecting on the sheer simplicity

Where much twiddling sets you free

A Passing Rhyme

A Fond Farewell

My friends and foes all in the past

My loved ones always unsurpassed

Those days we spent in joy and fun

Helped heal my soul with golden sun

Those private times that special day

So much was shared in every way

And in that evening’s twilight glow

No more to say just time to go

My burden eased no toil or task

To be remembered is all to ask

Cliff Letts

"In the Netherlands, they have something called the lonely funeral project. If someone dies and there’s no one to claim the body or to attend the funeral, a local poet researches the person, writes a poem about them and reads it at the ceremony."

https://frombelgiumwithbooklove.com/what-ive-learnt-from-reading-fiction-part-9/

Rhymes About The Changes

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When everything is changing

Everywhere you look

Where the rules become ridiculous

With nothing by the book

When everything explainable

Becomes a lame excuse

Where the reasons are unreasonable

With little to deduce

When everything brings you dismay

It’s the way its always been

After farms and manufacturing

Became the dominant machine

In a  space of so much everything

So many hoping for a share

Where the likelihood of something good

From those who have is getting rare

Me a Tree and a Family

Picture unashamedly nobbled from a tweet

from Albert@OwdAlbert

How did I get to be me?

Where do I sit among ‘We’?

Where do we stretch?

For I’d like to fetch?

From the roots of my ancestor’s tree

How long must it take to reveal?

What so many years can conceal

All the living that passed

By coincidence cast

By the spin of my lineage wheel

As I delve down the alleyways gone

Visiting stones laid upon

Is it likely I’ll see?

Early versions of me

Or a light that was never outshone

In perusing the records of past lives I believe one is looking for clues to the self. However one soon discovers that there are so many differences in previous lives as to hide the real map of there and then.

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Love Letters

Picture by Leighann Blackwood - unsplash.com

She loved to write with a friendly pen

Oozing all sorts of affable words

Like kindly pleasant and cordial

To the tune of sweet hummingbirds

Affectionate pens write in courteous script

Best suited to amiable eyes

Sociable, genial and kindly

With agreeable words to the wise

Her lovable pen delightfully wrote

Sincerely with heart felt accord

To confer and bestow agreeably so

An appraise one could always afford

See You!

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In our ever-decreasing circles

We see Infrequent passers by

Secluded deep in second thoughts

No longer wondering why

Working hard asserting arms-length

Safety first’s headline exclusive

Chinwag’s kept to minimums

As market halls become reclusive

The draw of being out there

Has lost its power of attraction

Consumed by fear of being near

Losing face in mass contraction

One day when we get the edge

Let art and science lead the way

To win the war of things invisible

Then learn again to have our say

Tempo Tantrums

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Ticking clocks a sound reminder
Whisper questions to the air
Why does time in passing
Rarely spread an equal share

Like a fortune wheel selector
Where the pointer comes to rest
Your numbers up when out of luck
To leave your future dispossessed

Until that time when winding up
Take the weather as it comes
We cannot dwell on lucky stars
They do not count in lifeline’s sums

Pendulum’s are primed to swing
Until the driving force depletes
To centre stage and curtain calls
Where before and after meets

In the distant hour a baby's cry
Pulsates with furious heart
Demanding full attendance to
A newly wound and hurried start

The perfect pulse begins again
Not taking sides or second guesses
Driven by a swing momentum
A two-way arc where more or less is